Archive for the ‘Hammond Weep’ tag

Scootmobiles weren’t exactly a craze, but there were enough of them built during and just after WWII for the word to gain currency. In the absence of new cars and with gas severely rationed, backyard inventors were essentially recreating the cyclecar, home building light one- or two-seaters, with gas mileage as the ultimate priority. Where they deviated from the template was in the, um, individuality of the projects. Most were bitsas, taking components from multiple cars and often, planes and boats, including belly tanks and other hardware. The name came from what we call soap-box derby racers today; in the Teens and Twenties “scootmobile” was sometimes used. Springfield, Massachusetts’ Martin also experimented with a light car by that name in the early Twenties.

Edward C. Hammond was an unlikely candidate to build a scootmobile – the Boston-area man was a Harvard grad, wealthy retired lumber merchant, and yachtsman (he had Lawley & Son build him a 42-foot cabin cruiser for something over $30,000, perhaps $1 million in today’s money). He also had a creative side, and during the First World War, he’d been involved in the (wood) materials side of aircraft construction.

For whatever reason, probably a combination of fun and unused mental capacity, in 1943 he started putting together a scootmobile. According to Ed Herlihy in a newsreel account, he used “Yankee ingenuity, plus parts from 16 autos, a tractor, a trailer and one sailboat, thank you.” More than a novelty, Hammond claimed 40 MPG and 40 MPH, and apparently used it, as it later featured a hand-forged snowplow. According to The New York Times, people would “stand awestruck” when he drove it on the streets through his genteel suburb.

Titled as a “1943 Hammond Weep #1 Open Runabout Scootmobile,” it ended up in the possession of one Mrs. Carmela E. Toscano of Auburndale, Massachusetts. In 1960, she wrote to Popular Mechanics about it, and aside from running down where all the parts came from, also mentioned that Hammond had died by then.

Around 10 years later, she sent the above photo into Special Interest Autos #5, while advertising it in Hemmings. If you watch the newsreel footage, you’ll see several changes between the Scootmobile in the Forties and Seventies, but that’s fully in keeping with its character.

I think no one would be surprised if it was scrapped, but I’d love to know if it survived.